Author: Soutie

Chinese checkers

The government’s foreign policy follows the rules of Chinese checkers. They’ve always got to check with the Chinese to see if it’s alright to issue a visa.

For a third time in five years the Dalai Lama has been denied a visa to South Africa..

He had been invited to attend the 14th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates next month,  being held in Cape Town.

Report here

(cartoon recreated from today’s “Crack of dawn” published in the Cape Times)

Currie Cup ~ E.P. v W.P

My programme

The Currie Cup is reputed to be the oldest rugby provincial competition in the world and after a 12 year absence my Eastern Province is back in it!

It’s the top tier of S.A. rugby and yes, you’ve probably guessed by now we (EP) have never won it.

We won’t be winning it this year either but that matters not, the season kicked off last night with our first pool game against Western Province.

After our highly successful Super rugby campaign last year most of our players have been bought / stole / enticed away to ‘bigger’ clubs. (A Scottish bunch even enticed our coach away along with one of our best flankers!)

So, lots of new names to learn last night, lots of fringe players from last season getting a chance to step up to the big time lots of mistakes and drama but who cares (not me) another great night of rugby in our very own new stadium.

You can see that the Eastern Province team have reverted back to the famous Red and Black hoops kit, no more pandering to advertisers and promoters, no more dull black or white shirts that any true EP fans have absolutely no affinity with whatsoever, no, back to our famous red and black.

As you all know by know, results are hard to come by down here, suffice to say that we scored our first Currie Cup try in 12 years in the 32nd minute and led 11-10 at halftime, then the wheels fell off.

But a great evening, a great competition, it’s good to be back! Continue reading “Currie Cup ~ E.P. v W.P”

Metatarsals

Watching Sky Sports news yesterday evening Jim White (that’s him on the left) told us that a famous footballer for some football club or other would be out of action for a period of time because of “a broken 5th metatarsal.”

He then went on to add “I didn’t even know that we had 5 of them”

Was this an attempt at humour? Or just plain ignorance?

Well I have news for you Jim, we all actually have 10 of them! Which would appear to be more than the number of brain cells required to sit in your chair.

The Open coverage scores 3/10

My book jacket

It’s rubbish!

In fact my 3 out of 10 includes 2 bonus points for the wonderful commentary and anecdotes of Peter Alliss, I have a book of his on the history of The Open, that’s my book jacket on the left but more on that later.

The camerawork is poor, failing to follow balls in the air, frequently having no idea where balls have landed and by way of apology panning across the green / fairway in the hope that somebody may spot it. Well, without an outdoor size mega TV screen with hi def we the viewers have no chance!

This from yesterday’s Mail by way of example …

It’s not great for the BBC – faced with Sky and their superior golf production challenging for Open rights from 2016 – that their cameraman on the second hole missed one of the shots of the tournament as Sergio Garcia holed with his second for an eagle two.

Fifteen minutes later, BBC finally showed a replay from behind of Garcia hitting the ball, but lost sight of its progress to the pin.

The captions or the lack thereof, are rubbish! Frequently wrong, “eagle putt” it says, no it wasn’t, it was for birdie, “4th shot” it says, no it wasn’t etc. etc.

And as for that ridiculous round detail where 18 holes are simply listed left to right without spaces,  the player’s scores underneath is not only difficult to read but is shown for such a short space of time to allow any logical analysis impossible. Continue reading “The Open coverage scores 3/10”

Faggots

Firstly let me make it absolutely clear that this post has absolutely nothing to do with Elton John, gay marriage, the adoption of babies by same sex couples, the B&B in Cornwall nor the ridiculous furore which has erupted this week over the Belfast bakery which refused to put “I love gays” or some such on their cakes. No, it’s about my mate Pete. Continue reading “Faggots”